Fighting the Right

Family Research Council president Tony Perkins joined MassResistance president Brian Camenker in condemning the Boston Red Sox for hosting a “Pride Night,” which included Jason Collins throwing out the ceremonial first pitch. Red Sox fans gave Collins a standing ovation, despite Perkins’ erroneous claim that “most parents object to” gay rights. Perkins quoted Camenker in calling homosexuality “destructive” and called on fans to tell the franchise not to “bombard families with a controversial message.”

This month, the Red Sox are delivering a new pitch--for homosexual rights. Hello, I'm Tony Perkins with the Family Research Council in Washington. The Red Sox may have won their game on June 6th, but they sure struck out with some fans. People who paid to watch baseball had to sit through a celebration of homosexuality, too. For the first time in franchise history, Boston decided to host "Pride Night" and bombard families with a controversial message. Jason Collins, the openly gay NBA player, threw out the first pitch. And the Sox even donated a portion of the proceeds to a radical LGBT group. Unfortunately for parents, the team kicked off its "Calling All Kids" program the same night, meaning that a lot of children were exposed to an agenda--and a topic--most parents object to. "For a professional sports team to promote behavior that's destructive," said conservative Brian Camenker, "... is problematic." Let's hope the Sox hear from a lot of fans who tell Fenway that's no way to run a franchise!

While Perkins was upset that the Red Sox welcomed gay fans, he thanked a Florida museum that discriminated against a family headed by same-sex partners by revoking their “family membership.” He even accused the parents of persecuting the museum:

At a Jacksonville children's museum, they've got one thing on display: religious conviction. Hello, I'm Tony Perkins with the Family Research Council in Washington. When it comes to the family, there are no substitutions. That's what a Florida children's museum tried to explain to a lesbian couple, who wanted a family discount. We're sorry, the director said, but the museum's policies are very specific about families needing a mom and a dad. So is Florida law, which defines marriage as a union of a man and woman. So when a mom put her name where the application said "dad," the office was justified in saying no. The difference was only $10, but that didn't matter to the woman, who shouted down the director and threatened to sue. In a statement, the museum said it did nothing wrong by making a policy consistent with their religious beliefs. These days, people care more about political correctness than right and wrong. And if America isn't careful, this museum's freedom will be just another relic from a bygone age.

In December, Liberty Counsel head Mat Staver told conservative radio host Janet Parshall that a Supreme Court ruling favorable to marriage equality “could cause another civil war” or even a second revolution. While speaking to Parshall last week, Staver argued that the court’s decision would have “a catastrophic consequence” for freedom, liberty and even “human existence” itself.

The Liberty University law school dean, who said that Obama will introduce “forced homosexuality,” went on to say that the Supreme Court’s decision could lead to civil and criminal penalties for opponents of same-sex marriage, such as losing one’s job. As a result, anti-gay activists “cannot acknowledge that decision as being a legitimate one” and should treat the Supreme Court as “an illegitimate institution.”

If the court goes the wrong way within the next week on these issues, it will become an illegitimate institution and we should treat it as such. It is that dire. It is exactly as simple and as plain as you said it: God said marriage is between one man and one woman, and some civil institution says no it’s not. That has a catastrophic consequence for our religious freedom, for the very function of the family, for marriage, for our human existence, for civil society and for any area of our liberty, it is a catastrophic game changer and it will be more destructive than Roe v. Wade. Why? Because Roe v. Wade, as destructive as it is and it is destructive, does not force you to have an abortion. Now Obamacare is forcing us now to fund abortion. But this will not just simply say, ‘ok same-sex marriage, I don’t agree with it but I can go on and live my life,’ no. You want to work in the DOJ? You’ve got to support it. You want to work in any other area? You’ve got to endorse it. This will not be coexistence, this will not be the government’s got a bad policy, this will be the government’s got a bad policy but you must advance it, you must support it; if you don’t, you will be punished, you won’t have your job, you will be punished in some other civil or even criminal way. That’s why it’s going to be more coercive than Roe v. Wade, it is a line—I’m telling you, I’m hoping people understand this—that we cannot cross. If we cross that line, we have to push back; we cannot acknowledge that decision as being a legitimate one.

Last week, the Frederick Douglass Society hosted a Junteenth Celebration in Michigan at which Gary Glenn of the American Family Association spoke.

During his remarks, Glenn declared that the Republican Party had been formed for the express purpose of fighting slavery and defending marriage, which inspired him tie Martin Luther King's famous "Letter from Birmingham Jail" to the forthcoming Supreme Court decisions on marriage equality by calling on Christians and the governors of the states which have outlawed gay marriage to ignore any ruling that might strike down those laws.

"With the heritage we have from the freedom fighters and the Freedom Riders who came before us," Glenn declared, "God forgive us if we fail to stand. But if we do, as Martin Luther King said we should do to fulfill our Christian duty, we will threaten those, we will over come those who threaten our faith and freedom. And we will be proud to stand with you in that struggle for our faith [and] we will be blessed for doing so":

Christian Action League head Mark Creech is mourning the collapse of the ex-gay group Exodus International today in the Christian Post, arguing that Christians should not believe that sexual orientation exists as it is merely “a broad term developed in modern times to provide credence for the growing number of sexual perversions.”

Creech urged people to dismiss claims from gay people who believe that their orientation was shaped by biological factors, just as they would refuse to affirm a person who thinks they are really a squirrel: “if one felt that he or she was a squirrel, would that qualify as proof that one was justified in risking life and limb by climbing trees and eating only nuts?”

But Russell Moore, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, takes umbrage with Chambers' apology, arguing: "I think there is a tendency to see Exodus folding as a parable of Christian capitulation and ethic. That is not what is happening. Instead what you have is an organization that has some confusion about its mission and purpose…What is not happening here, is an evangelical revision of a biblical sexual ethic."

Peter LaBarbera, who leads Americans for Truth About Homosxuality [sic], would agree with Moore. When OneNewsNow recently asked LaBarbera about Exodus shutting down, he said, "I think Alan Chambers, who basically ruined the organization, had no choice because the affiliates were leaving. All the people who support the truth that homosexuals can change and overcome this perversion through Jesus Christ were leaving Exodus."

LaBarbera, who called Exodus' closing one of the greatest tragedies he had witnessed in the pro-family movement, also shared where he believes the ministry made its fatal mistake. He said, "Homosexuality is about behavior, and behaviors can be changed with the help of God and through Christ…That's what Exodus used to be about. But once they started talking about so called 'gay sexual orientation,' as if this is the inherent state of somebody's being, they got in trouble."

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It's interesting that the concept of "sexual orientation" is based strongly upon one's feelings. How does one know that one is gay? Conventional wisdom says because of the way one feels. Numerous are the individuals who have said, "I've felt that I was gay since I was a child." But if one felt that he or she was a squirrel, would that qualify as proof that one was justified in risking life and limb by climbing trees and eating only nuts?

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To those who would contend the Bible is silent about "sexual orientation," let it be said this is because no such notion is based in truth. It is a broad term developed in modern times to provide credence for the growing number of sexual perversions.

Robert Knight of the American Civil Rights Union today penned an “if I were the devil” column, inspired by radio commentator Paul Harvey. As you probably already guessed, he claims Satan is pushing marriage equality to attack religious people, convinced the Boy Scouts to “commit suicide” by including openly gay scouts and expanded healthcare access through Obamacare.

Knight, while writing for the Unification Church-tied Washington Times, called the Episcopal Church a “subsidiary” of the Devil and claimed the government is becoming a Satanic tool to “throttle freedom of speech, religion and association,” to use same-sex marriage to “unleash the power of the state against all those ‘religious’ folks” and convinced the Boy Scouts to “commit suicide.”

If I were Beelzebub, I’d work to destroy Western civilization, because its chief religions, Christianity and Judaism, have a timeless book that reminds people of my existence. I’m most effective when unacknowledged.

To this end, I’m working to do away with institutions that are in the way of my goal of destroying humanity. These pesky confederations include churches, observant temples, private groups and governments that support so-called traditional values such as honor, fidelity in marriage, strong families, personal responsibility, civic pride, charity and patriotism.

When these things are compromised, I move on to the game board’s next square — economic freedom, which I cannot abide and which cannot thrive without the virtues imparted by those irritating groups just mentioned. For a look at one of my greatest successes, take a walk through what used to be Detroit.

Once free enterprise is broken to the saddle of the state, I can throttle freedom of speech, religion and association, using some of the giant corporations spawned in the unprecedented liberty created by America’s system of constitutional rights, including private property.

In fact, I used some of those firms just the other day to induce the Boy Scouts of America to commit suicide, one of my prized outcomes. Under corporate-donor pressure, the Scout leadership threw aside the common-sense rule preventing open expression of homosexuality. This pretty much did the trick in Canada. It may take a few years, but the Scouts in the United States are finished, believe me. If you like what you see in the inner cities among fatherless boys, you’ll thank me later.

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In 1993, the Girl Scouts USA opened their leader ranks to lesbians and atheists and adopted a policy allowing girls to substitute “Allah” or “Buddha” or perhaps “Elvira” in the Girl Scout promise, “On my honor, I will try to serve God and my country.” Most of the girls and their local leaders peddling cookies are blissfully unaware of such fundamental ferment at the top, and I’m determined to keep it that way. So keep this under your hat, will you?

Other projects going smoothly include weeding Christians out of the U.S. armed forces, concentrating ever more power in Washington, D.C., through Obamacare, expanding the Infernal Revenue Service (no, it’s not a typo), opening the floodgates of pornography even wider, and pushing for universal preschool to get the tykes away from bothersome parents sooner.

Over the next couple of weeks, I’ll be finishing up perhaps my most important project since World War II: Using the Supreme Court to wreck the most vital, irreplaceable institution in society — marriage. If I can persuade one more justice that the Constitution harbors the “right” to abolish marriage through radical redefinition, I can unleash the power of the state against all those “religious” folks who cling to their, well, religion.

But not all of them.

One of my subsidiaries, the Episcopal Church USA, is doing marvelous work muddying up what the Bible clearly says is right and wrong. I’m thinking of upping their budget to purchase a new, improved smoke machine.

Larry Klayman has notbeenshy about warning that armed rebellion might be necessary to fight President Obama's efforts to enslave every American, and so it was not much of a surprise when he sat down with WND to discuss his various lawsuits that he declared that, if the courts don't rule in his favor and stop the government efforts to "make us its prisoners," this will be the last opportunity to "try to take the country back."

"The American people are being pushed up against the wall," Klayman warned, "and unless our judicial institutions start working and representing the American people, there's going to be catastrophe in this country":

Back in 2011, David Barton of WallBuilders claimed that public schools want to “force [children] to be homosexual” rather than “develop naturally.” He based his claims on a letter from the American College of Pediatricians, which he described as “the leading pediatric association in America.”

Today, the conservative Washington Times ran a “fair and balanced” article which cited the ACP to rebut claims by the American Academy of Pediatrics, the country’s principal pediatric organization and an opponent of homophobia and sexual orientation conversion therapy.

ACP’s Dr. Den Trumbull told the Washington Times that nearly all gay and lesbian youth through “spontenous and assisted change” will “return to heterosexual orientation.” Dr. Jerry Miller Jr. of the Christian Medical and Dental Associations concurred and added: “I do not think we should normalize these kinds of behaviors and orientations…we want our patients to thrive, and we just don’t think that is going to occur in that [LGBTQ] lifestyle,” which he compared to alcohol and drug abuse.

“Sexual-minority youth should not be considered abnormal,” the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) said in its new materials on lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning (LGBTQ) youths, released Monday.

…

“That’s where we would disagree. Major, major disagreement,” said Dr. Den Trumbull, president of the American College of Pediatricians, which was formed in 2002 as an alternative to AAP over its policy on gay adoption.

Another group, Christian Medical and Dental Associations (CMDA), says “homosexual behavior can be changed,” and children experiencing “gender-identity confusion” should receive therapy if needed, and be around “appropriate role models.”

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As many as 25 percent of youths experience “transient or temporary same-sex attractions,” yet the number of gay adults is much lower — 2 percent to 3 percent of the population, he said.

“Spontaneous and assisted change is possible,” and if a teen’s sexual-orientation confusion is not encouraged or validated, in the vast majority of cases, he or she “will return to heterosexual orientation,” said Dr. Trumbull, who has a pediatrics practice in Alabama.

“It’s wrong for anyone to be bullied or mocked or stigmatized. At the same time — and I know this is heresy to the lesbian and gay community — I do not think we should normalize these kinds of behaviors and orientations,” said Dr. Jerry A. Miller Jr., a pediatrician in Augusta, Ga., who is chairman of the CMDA’s pediatric section

. Teens can get involved in so many risky behaviors, especially regarding drugs, alcohol and sex, said Dr. Miller. As caring physicians, “we want our patients to thrive, and we just don’t think that is going to occur in that [LGBTQ] lifestyle.”

Earlier this month, a pair of nine year old twin sisters with two moms introduced President Obama at an LGBT Pride Month reception at the White House, and Linda Harvey is predictably disturbed about the whole thing, accusing Obama and gay activists of exploiting children in "support of a radical agenda":

One of the most outrageous things President Obama has done in his lavish support for all aspects of the homosexual agenda is to exploit the innocence of children.

At a homosexual pride event at the White House, he allowed two third grade girls to introduce him. It's really heartbreaking, friends, to see these sweet little girls enlisted to support a radical agenda. They said they have two moms when the truth is they have one mom and, somewhere, one dad.

So this is what these folks are proud up and despite what seems to be very sincerely-held beliefs, they are profoundly wrong and all of this will end up hurting many people, including children.

The homosexual movement is fast becoming a club to silence people who don't want to support this and don't want this taught to their children.

But there is hope, Harvey went on to inform her listeners, because July is "Ex-Gay Pride Month":

Voice of the Voiceless (VoV) is excited to announce the First Annual Ex-Gay Pride Month in July 2013! If you or your organization is interested in partnering to help sponsor our Ex-Gay Pride Awareness Day on the Washington, DC National Mall and Evening Dinner/Reception, please contact Co-Founder and Acting Director, Christopher Doyle at cdoyle@voiceofthevoiceless.info

We are actively working to receive a Presidential Proclamation from The White House to commemorate Ex-Gay Pride Month and are speaking with members of Congress to recognize and participate in our first annual Awareness Event on the National Mall and Evening Dinner/Reception in Washington, DC. See below for more details on Ex-Gay Pride!

When is Ex-Gay Pride? VoV is strategically holding Ex-Gay Pride Month in July, after June's annual gay pride month, in order to draw attention to the ever-increasing phenomenon of ex-gays or former homosexuals; that is, individuals who formerly had unwanted same-sex attractions and/or lived an LGBT-identified life, but now do not. These individuals may be in heterosexual relationships, pursuing heterosexuality, or living celibate lives as former homosexuals.

WHAT is Ex-Gay Pride? A time to recognize the unique experiences of ex-gays and former homosexuals and celebrate their existence in American culture. VoV is currently organizing events in the month of July to highlight the unique role of ex-gays in American culture and draw attention to increasing discrimination and hostility towards the ex-gay community in society.

WHY Ex-Gay Pride? Because former homosexuals are the last invisible minority in American culture and are increasingly subject to hostility from anti-ex-gay activists and the media at large, who is influenced heavily by the gay-activist lobby that discriminates and marginalizes former homosexuals. VoV estimates that ex-gays number in the tens of thousands (at least), but due to intimation and hostility, the exact numbers are unknown.

WHERE is Ex-Gay Pride? Currently, VoV plans to hold at least one event in Washington, DC in July to commemorate the First Annual Ex-Gay Pride Month. Because Washington, DC is the only jurisdiction that recognizes ex-gays as a protected class against discrimination in the United States, we believe this is a safe place to gather and celebrate free from any threat of intimidation.

WHO Should Participate in Ex-Gay Pride? If you are a former homosexual, individual with unwanted same-sex attraction (SSA), a friend or family member that knows an ex-gay or individual with unwanted SSA, or one of our allies, we welcome your support and presence at any of our events! Please e-mail cdoyle@voiceofthevoiceless.info for more details on how you can participate.

HOW Can I Participate in Ex-Gay Pride? VoV is currently looking for individuals and organizations to partner with us and help sponsor an awareness event on the Washington, DC National Mall and an evening dinner/reception to celebrate and commemorate ex-gays in the United States. It is important that we let our voices be heard or we'll continue to face marginalization and discrimination. This event is meant to celebrate and unite together for a common goal: to increase our public visability, tell our stories proudly, celebrate our unique contributions towards American culture, and unite against the hatred and bigotry against our communities.

The Family Research Council’s Tony Perkins is out with his latest anti-Obama screed. In a fundraising letter dated July 17, Perkins slams the president and his administration for “colluding” with the Southern Poverty Law Center as part of a nefarious plan to create a totalitarian government. Perkins complains about the Justice Department utilizing SPLC’s expertise on extremist groups in training sessions; his letter includes a petition to congressional leaders calling for a formal investigation of the SPLC and its relationship with the Obama administration.

Perkins has been on the rhetorical warpath against the SPLC since it labeled FRC an anti-gay hate group for a history of false and denigrating statements about gay people. In addition, he blames the SPLC for an attack on FRC’s headquarters by a gunman last year. In the new letter, Perkins repeats those claims and ties the SPLC and the Obama administration together in a conspiracy to “sow discord, undermine the Constitution, and bully people of faith.” Here are some excerpts from the four-page letter:

The anti-Christian crusade instigated by the SPLC has already resulted in an armed terrorist attack on Family Research Council headquarters in Washington, D.C…

The President needs to be exposed for colluding with the SPLC to stifle debate on social policy issues by means of intimidation, fear-mongering, and spreading lies…

The majority of Americans do not agree with the President’s leftist agenda to remake our country into a socialist state ruled by a totalitarian government bureaucracy. And the President knows this. So he is using—and abusing—his presidency to steamroll the American people and implement his radical vision for America…

With less than four years left in office, President Obama is going for broke to accomplish his far-left agenda. In addition to the collusion between his administration and the SPLC, Planned Parenthood, and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender organizations, President Obama is using the bully pulpit and power of the presidency to promote abortion and same-sex “marriage” while stifling religious freedom at the same time…

This assault on religious freedom in the military is part of a wider plan to neuter the Church and its stand for the timeless values of faith, family and freedom in America…

Moreover, it’s no secret that President Obama is willing to spend your tax dollars to further his plans for legalizing same-sex “marriage”, increasing access to abortion, and silencing Christians...

We cannot side on the sidelines. We cannot close our eyes and hope this will go away. We must stand boldly, yet in love, against hate-filled anti-Christian groups who incite hatred and violence to intimidate us into silence.

Thank you in advance for standing with us in defense of what is right. With God’s grace, we will stop this pernicious evil against people of faith in America.

Given Perkins’ belief that Obama’s re-election was a symptom of “a deeper moral and spiritual problem” in America, and his willingness to promote rabid anti-Obama conspiracy theories, his new letter is not terribly surprising. But it’s good to keep in mind the next time you hear him or some other FRC spokesperson calling for more civility in the public arena.

As we noted yesterday, Glenn Beck now believes that Tea Party and 9/12 activists are the new leaders of the civil rights movement, so it only stands to reason that the anti-IRS/anti-immigration rally they held outside the Capitol earlier this week "is going to be written about in future history books."

Beck understood that this pronouncement might sound far-fetched, but so did his warnings of an economic collapse and the rise of the caliphate ... but that is only because Beck is just too far ahead of everyone else and so it takes time for things to develop as he predicted and people to realize that he was right all along.

And so it will be with this new civil rights movement, which everyone will understand maybe in a year from now as it becomes "a movement that our great, great grandchildren and their children will read about":

On his radio program yesterday, Bryan Fischer spent a segment gloating about how President Obama's recent speech in Berlin was an "absolute abysmal, colossal failure" because he spoke to only 4,500 invited guests, in comparison to the crowd of 200,000 who turned out to hear him when he spoke there as a candidate back in 2008 (unlike, say, President George W. Bush who was met by 20,000 protestors when he traveled there in 2002.)

"The thrill is gone from Barack Obama," Fischer declared as he predicted that Democrats would now put all of their support behind Hillary Clinton.

"What you're about to see," Fischer predicted, "is Barack Obama is going to be kicked to the back of the Democratic bus. This guy has now become a liability ... and the Democratic Party is going to tell him to sit in the back of the bus; the front of the Democratic bus belongs to the white person, Hillary Clinton":

As the nation awaits the Supreme Court's rulings on two high-profile marriage equality cases, several dozen Religious Right activists have signed on to a "Marriage Solidarity Statement" that was drafted by Liberty Counsel's Mat Staver and Deacon Keith Fournier, vowing to resist any ruling in favor of equality.

This who's who of anti-gay activists has collectively declared that they "will not stand by while the destruction of the institution of marriage unfolds in this nation we love" because "this is the line we must draw and one we cannot and will not cross":

As Christian citizens united together, we will not stand by while the destruction of the institution of marriage unfolds in this nation we love. The Sacred Scriptures and unbroken teaching of the Church confirm that marriage is between one man and one woman. We stand together in solidarity to defend marriage and the family and society founded upon them. The effort to redefine marriage threatens the proper mediating role of the Church in society.

Experience and history have shown us that if the government redefines marriage to grant a legal equivalency to same-sex couples, that same government will then enforce such an action with the police power of the State. This will bring about an inevitable collision with religious freedom and conscience rights. We cannot and will not allow this to occur on our watch. Religious freedom is the first freedom in the American experiment for good reason.

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If the Supreme Court were to issue a decision that redefined marriage or provided a precedent on which to build an argument to redefine marriage, the Supreme Court will thereby undermine its legitimacy. The Court will significantly decrease its credibility and impair the role it has assumed for itself as a moral authority. It will be acting beyond its proper constitutional role and contrary to the Natural Moral Law which transcends religions, culture, and time.

As Christians united together in defense of marriage, we pray that this will not happen. But, make no mistake about our resolve. While there are many things we can endure, redefining marriage is so fundamental to the natural order and the true common good that this is the line we must draw and one we cannot and will not cross.

Considering that Staver and others who signed this declaration have predicted that any ruling in favor of gay marriage will lead to civil war, one has to wonder just how these anti-gay activists intend to resist any such ruling.

Mission America's Linda Harvey was a guest on AFA's "Today's Issues" radio program this morning, where she discussed the dangers of marriage equality.

As Harvey explained it, if gay marriage ever becomes accepted at part of the culture norm, it will fundamentally warp the worldview of children who will grow up thinking that it is okay to marry someone of the same sex. And if that ever happens, "it will revolutionize the psychology and spiritual development" of children by removing the fundamental "security level" that all previous generations understood.

"It's going to mess with their hearts, their minds, their spirits, and their bodies," Harvey warned. "I think that we are looking toward; I don't know that this is, maybe it's too strong a word, but raising barbarians":

Here’s a question for Ralph Reed and the ‘Teavangelical’ wing of the conservative movement: how can you portray yourselves as serious about governing when the keynote speakers at last week’s “Road to Majority” conference were Donald Trump and Sarah Palin?

Palin’s conference-closing remarks on Saturday featured a breathtakingly offensive joke about the Syrian civil war, which has taken an estimated 100,000 lives. She said we should just “let Allah sort it out.” Palin also had choice words for the bipartisan immigration reform bill moving through the Senate, which she dismissed as “a pandering, rewarding-the-rule-breakers, still-no-border-security, special-interest-written amnesty bill.” She was one of many conference speakers rhetorically crapping on Marco Rubio and the bipartisan “Gang of 8” reform bill and burning the bridges that conservative Latinos are trying to build.

At Friday night’s “gala” Reed bestowed a lifetime achievement award on Pat Robertson, who is increasingly difficult to take seriously, and who devoted his remarks to trashing President Obama. Trump, who also addressed the gala, spoke mostly about his own Trumpian greatness and how Mitt Romney might have been president if he had the guts to run Trump’s anti-Obama “you’re fired” ad. Trump shared plenty of pablum and piercing political insights, such as the Republicans needing to be “really smart” in choosing a “great candidate” in 2016. Trump also criticized the immigration reform bill as a “death wish” for the Republican Party, saying “every one of those people, and the tens of millions of people they will bring in with them, will be absolutely voting Democratic.”

There’s no question Ralph Reed still has pull. His conference opened with a luncheon featuring four Tea Party senators and he got a handful of Republican House members to speak along with former and future presidential hopefuls like Mike Huckabee, Herman Cain, Rick Santorum, and Ted Cruz. Rick Perry, who was introduced as a “Renaissance man,” bragged about the law he recently signed to protect the ostensibly threatened right of public school students to wish each other “Merry Christmas” Perry said, ““I hope my state is a glowing example of men and women who believe that those traditional values are how you make a stronger society.” Stronger society? Not so much.

In addition to the divide on immigration, relentless attacks on President Obama (Dick Morris said of the president, “he doesn’t care about national security”), and the unsurprising rhetoric on abortion, marriage, and supposed threats to religious liberty, there were some other major themes:

Government Bad

The conference was infused with the Tea Party’s anti-federal-government themes. Jonah Goldberg of the National Review reminded people of a video shown at the 2012 Democratic National Convention, which he recalled saying the government is the one thing we all belong to. “Now, as sort of a Tea Party-ish kind of guy, that makes me want to flip the safety on my rifle.”

Speakers urged activists to take advantage of the recent scandals surrounding the IRS, the Justice Department, and the National Security Agency. Santorum urged activists to “think big” and “seize the moment” provided by the IRS scandal. Sen. Ron Johnson said he would like Americans to apply their disgust about the scandals to the federal government in general. Rather than trying to restore faith in government, Johnson said, activists should be fostering distrust of the government.

Grover Norquist is known for his quip that he wants to shrink the government until it is small enough to drown in the bathtub. At Road to Majority he spelled out his plan to complete the strategy he embarked on with the Bush tax cuts and the no-tax-increase pledge he demands Republican candidates sign. He noted that “thanks to the marvels of modern redistricting,” Republicans are likely to have a Republican House until 2022, which means they have several chances to get a Senate majority and a Republican in the White House before then. Whenever that happens, he says, Republicans can put the Ryan budget into law and dramatically curtail government spending. He calls it “completely doable.”

Meanwhile, he said, in the 25 states where Republicans control the legislative and executive branches, activists should push for the passage of more anti-union legislation, and for laws that encourage people to obtain concealed carry permits, home school their children, and participate in stock ownership, three things that he said make people more Republican. He called this changing the demographics by changing the rules.

Obamacare: Will it Destroy America or Obama?

House Republicans have made repealing the Affordable Care Act – “Obamacare” – an obsession. Rick Santorum said opposition to the law should have been the centerpiece of the 2012 campaign. And many speakers repeated the demand that the health care reform law be repealed in its entirety. Stephen Moore, founder of the Club for Growth and a Wall Street Journal editorial board member, said repealing Obamacare is the single most important thing that has to happen in Washington over the next two years. But a number of speakers had a slightly different take, suggesting that the implementation of the complex law would be its undoing, and that public outrage at rising insurance rates would bring down the Obama administration. Dick Morris predicted Obama would be “destroyed” by the law’s implementation.

GOP: Friend or Foe?

One running theme of the conference was conservative activists’ distrust for national Republican leaders, particularly around opposition to abortion and LGBT equality. Several speakers made reference to the notorious RNC “autopsy” on the 2012 election and the perception that some party leaders want social conservatives to tone it down. Reed himself complained that while self-identified evangelicals represented 45 percent of the Republican ticket’s vote, some party leaders were saying they are the problem and should “ride in the back of the bus.” He vowed that on issue of abortion and man-woman marriage, social conservatives would not be silent, “not now, not ever.”

It’s not just Ted Cruz who mocks his fellow Republicans. Gary Bauer complained that the last two Republican nominees had a hard time talking about sanctity of life issues, and he said party officials in Washington spend too much time taking the advice of “cowardly pollsters and political consultants.” Mike Huckabee complained that “Republicans have been, if not equal, sometimes more guilty than Democrats in thinking the brilliant thing to do would be to centralize more power in the hands of the central government.” He said he’s “sick of hearing” that people think the GOP needs to move away from a conservative message.

There was enough grumbling that when it was RNC Chairman Reince Priebus’s turn to speak on Saturday, the Wisconsin Faith & Freedom official who introduced him felt a need to vouch for Priebus’s faith and commitment to conservative causes. He said angrily that it is “an absolute lie” that Priebus is not a social conservative and insisted that there is no division in the party.

Priebus started his remarks by establishing his religious credentials: “I’m a Christian. I’m a believer. God lives in my heart, and I’m for changing minds, not changing values.” He added, “I’m so grateful that we’ve got a party that prays, that we’ve got a party that puts God first, and I’m proud to be part of that.” He said he “gets it” that conservative Christians are a “blessing” to the party. He said the GOP needs to have a permanent ground game in place all across the country.

Priebus defended his plan to shorten the presidential primary season and move the party convention from August to June from critics who call it an insider move against grassroots conservatives. It isn’t an establishment takeover, he insisted, but a way to prevent a replay of the 2012, when Romney went into the summer months broke after a long primary season but not yet able to tap general election funding.

Still, not all the conservative are convinced that national Republicans are with them. Palin portrayed Republicans in Washington as being overly fond of government spending: “It doesn’t matter if it’s a Republican or a Democrat sitting atop a bloated boot on your neck, out of control government, everyone gets infected, no party is immune. That’s why, I tell ya, I’m listening to those independents, to those libertarians who are saying, you know, it is both sides of the aisle, the leadership, the good old boys….”

Phyllis Schlafly talked about having waged internal battles to make the GOP a solidly anti-abortion Party and encouraged activists not to be seduced by talk of a conservative third party but to work within the Republican Party to make sure the right people on the ballot. Norquist insisted that activists had helped brand the GOP as the party that will not raise your taxes, and he said Republican elected officials who vote for tax increases damage the brand for everyone else. They are, he said, “rat heads in coca-cola.”

Message Envy

It might surprise many progressives, who have spent years bemoaning the effectiveness of Republicans’ emotion-laden rhetoric, that speaker after speaker complained that Democrats are so much better than Republicans at messaging. Of course complaining about messaging is easier than admitting that there may be something about your policies that voters don’t like.

At a panel on messaging strategies, author Diane Medved said that when defending traditional marriage, she would love to say “what is it about ‘abomination’ that you don’t understand?” But she knows that won’t reach people who don’t already agree with her. She argued that conservatives should marshal the “science” that supports their positions. She also tried out a new messaging strategy, saying that opposition to marriage equality is a feminist issue because it is empowering to women to affirm that they are different than men. “Women deserve to have credit for being who they are as a separate gender and they are not interchangeable with men.”

Ryan Anderson, co-author of a book on marriage with Robert George, the intellectual godfather of the anti-marriage-equality movement, took issue with the name of the panel, which was “Don’t Preach to the Choir.” Anderson said the choir needs to be preached to, because too many Christians are giving up on marriage. There is no such thing as parenting, he insisted, there is mothering and fathering. Anderson said that anti-marriage equality forces have only been fighting for five years, while proponents have been fighting for 20 to 30 years. “It’s not that our argument for marriage has been heard and been rejected,” he said. “It’s that it hasn’t been heard at all.” Anderson promoted the widely discredited Regnerus study on family structures as evidence that science is on his side.

Eric Teetsel, executive director of the Manhattan Declaration, encouraged activists to be careful with their rhetoric. “I don’t believe that there are very many, if any, people in this movement, certainly not in public life, who have any ill will toward the same-sex community, at all. But sometimes we say things that make it sound like we do.” If Teetsel really believes that, he needs to spend some more time actually listening to conservative religious leaders, pundits and politicians who regularly charge that gay-rights advocates are Satan-inspired sexual predators who are out to destroy faith and freedom if not western civilization itself.

Don’t Worry, Be Happy or Arguing as a Lover with Stupid Liberals

Anyone who pays attention to religious right groups has been seeing the word “winsome” a lot. Conservative evangelical leaders are well aware of polling data that shows young Christians are turned off by the anti-gay bigotry they see in the church. So there’s a push on for everyone to make conservative arguments in a “winsome” way, to be “happy warriors” like Ronald Reagan, to be cheerful when arguing with liberals. Being cheerful was a big theme at Road to Majority. Said Rick Perry, “when we fight for our county, we need to do it with joy.”

The Manhattan Declaration's Teetsel took this theme to new heights in the messaging panel in which he called for “arguing as a lover” when “trying to woo people over to our side”: be respectful, self-effacing, funny, give people an opportunity to save face. But he doesn’t seem to think much of his audience, saying America is no longer a society of ideas, and that in our celebrity-crazed culture it doesn’t make sense to appeal to 18th Century sources of authority like the Federalist Papers, which “are not considered authorities in my generation. People do not care what these men in wigs thought 300 years ago.”

“We serve a God who condescended to become a man in order to share his gospel. And I think that’s an example that we can learn from. Romans 12:16 advises us, do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. So we have to bite the bullet. We have to recognize some of these facts and condescend to watching Glee from time to time so that we can talk to people about it.”

On Tuesday evening's broadcast of "The Rachel Maddow Show," several of the clips we have posted from End Times radio host Rick Wiles were aired during a segment about the radical views held by various Republican congressional leaders.

For his part, Wiles was unaware that he had been featured on the program until he checked his email and voice-mail on Wednesday morning and found himself under an avalanche of messages attacking for the insane things that he has said. And as he explained on his radio program yesterday, the messages he received could only have come from "people who are demon-possessed" and serve as further proof that an anti-Christian holocaust is coming to America:

I discovered that MSNBC's socialist news commentator Rachel Maddow played a soundbite of me on her program last night. Thank you, Rachel. I appreciate the publicity even though there aren't that many people watching MSNBC, but I'll take all the publicity I can get.

The people who do watch it, however, have a visceral hate for Jesus Christ and Christians. In fifteen years of full-time ministry, I have never read or heard such ugly, hateful, threatening, vulgar, obscene, blasphemous messages in my life. Ever. I won't even repeat them because some of the things that they said about our lord and savior Jesus Christ is so vulgar, so blasphemous, that it only could be uttered by people who are demon-possessed.

The spirit of Antichrist is loose in America. A man of lawlessness is in the White House. His followers hate Christianity. And most of the American Christian church has yet to realize the scope and depth of this hellish hate that is boiling in the Obamanistas towards anybody who dares to profess biblical Christianity and morality.

It is the same spirit that rose up in the Nazis in Germany towards the Jews. This time it will be the Christians in America who are locked up or put to death.

Yesterday, Beck flew to Washington, DC for the anti-IRS/anti-immigration Tea Party rally outside the Capitol where, as he explained on his television program last night, he delivered a speech explaining to the audience that "this is a civil rights movement; you may not understand it now, but believe me, you will."

Calling upon the Tea Party to "start moving as a civil rights movement," Beck announced that he is going to be working with Alveda King, the anti-gay, anti-abortion Religious Right activist niece of Martin Luther King, who will start teaching "classes that model exactly what her uncle Martin taught her to do."

"We have to be willing to have the dogs be unleashed on us," Beck declared, because "after what I saw today on the way they're handling things at the Capitol, you're not very far from having the same kind of oppression coming our way":

Yesterday's TruNews radio broadcast with Rick Wiles was entirely dedicated to an interview with right-wing anti-Islam activist Walid Shoebat and his son Theodore during which the three of them attacked ... Glenn Beck!

That's right, according to the Shoebats, Beck is a practitioner of "Chrislam," meaning that he is luring his audience away from true Christianity and into a dangerous Islamo-Mormon deistic universalism with the help of Religious Right leaders such as James Robison, Franklin Graham, and David Barton.

As Theodore explained, Joseph Smith, the founder of the Church of Latter-Day Saints, considered himself to be a second Muhammad, which is why, Walid said, LDS members will not proselytize to Muslims since "basically they have the same faith":

Walid Shoebat: Glenn Beck isn't really calling for Christianity. He lies when he says 'I'm a Christian, I believe in salvation through Jesus Christ' because he, number one, denies the Trinity; number two, he's a deist. In other words, he believes Muslims and Mormons and all the cults together, Buddhists, believe in God and everybody should conform to this deistic view in belief in God. Why? Because we have a more important thing to deal with and that is the salvation of the country as a nation.

Theodore Shoebat: Why is Glenn Beck so fascinated with universalism? Why does he keep pushing universalism? Because it is part of his religion. People need to understand this about Mormonism. Mormonism is an extreme version of Chrislam. Joseph Smith observed the most extreme form of Islam you could ever imagine. In 1855, the earliest leaders of Mormonism, of the Latter-Day Saints, got together specifically to exalt the Prophet Muhammad. Joseph Smith stated that Muhammad was a prophet of god and that Muhammad suffered just as I have suffered; he paralleled himself to Muhammad. And in a very famous speech he made, the speech called 'Al-Koran or The Sword,' Joseph Smith stated 'in this generation, I will be the second Muhammad. Where it was in his generation the Koran or the sword, it will be in this generation Joseph Smith or the sword.'

Walid Shoebat: The Latter-Day Saints church has sought to respect Islamic laws, that is sharia - that's the thing that Glenn Beck claims to be fighting - and traditions that prohibit conversions of Muslims to other faiths by adopting a policy of non-proselytizing in Islamic countries in the Middle East. In other words, Mormons are not allowed to proselytize to Muslims in the Middle East. Why? Because basically they have the same faith.

Glenn Beck dedicated most of the opening monologue on his television program last night to continuing to warn against any US involvement in Syria, which inevitably led him to his giant blackboard so that he could provide another history lesson about how everything that happened leading up to World War II was rooted in hostility toward religion ... and it is happening again today, not only in Europe but in America as well.

"God is openly mocked," Beck declared, "and hedonism and darkness is being embraced" as he highlighted Charlie Sheen, Kim Kardashian, and Anthony Weiner as evidence.

"Quite honestly America, those are the easy ones," he said, "but if you just scratch just below the surface, you and I both know evil is running amok in our country and all over the globe":